If you want in in medical schools nowadays, especially in North Carolina med schools, you’d better say that you are interested in becoming a primary care doctor.
As we have mentioned earlier this year, there is a shortage of doctors in rural America, and that their greatest need right now is general practitioners. Because of this North Carolina has been trying to address the issue since 2006 when they aimed for 60% of medical schools graduates to enter primary care fields. Sadly, reality is still far from the goal with just 50% of the graduate going initially intro primary care fields and just 38% of that sticking with it by the end of 2007.
The figures are not surprising considering the discrepancy between the incomes of specialists ($320k – $450K annually) and primary doctors ($160K – $175k). With the mounting medical student debt and plain ambition there is no real reason why we should see the trend reversing anytime soon.
In the meantime, medical schools are trying to address the problem in the their own way by selecting more students who appear to have real interest in becoming primary care doctors.